I have encountered graffiti eggplants before. Thinking their stripes a sign they had been picked too early to take on the full coloration of mature eggplant, I didn’t pay them much mind. Turns out they are another variety of eggplant entirely. Fitting name, isn’t it? The pattern resembles an initial application of purple paint on a cream background — or is it the other way around? Whatever; I was not expecting to see some included with the Thai purple eggplants I brought back from Mahaplag.
They were rather small — just perfect for torta. The one thing I hate in that dish is a soggy center, which is what comes from using large eggplants, and I end up consuming only the portion around the crisped-up edges. Sayang. Yet eggplant omelette (stuffed eggplant to some) has never figured in my list of dishes to master, or even just to capably make.
It’s not the dish — it’s me. Just picturing the mess involved in frying tortang talong makes me wince. I’m the guy who wipes down the stove in the midst of cooking as the oil sizzles and spatters dangerously nearby. I can’t help it: the sight of grease where it doesn’t belong always makes me reach out for a towel. I’ve burned myself many times that way. That’s why I’ve banished any frying involving more than a quarter cup of oil to the dirty kitchen (out of sight, out of mind), but only if I trust the help to make a decent job of it. Otherwise (tempura and anything with wet batter come to mind), it stays in my realm.
But those petite graffiti eggplants finally inspired me to take a serious stab at torta. Besides, I needed to upgrade my eggplant repertoire. Since I don’t like meat in eggplant, I went with tofu and button mushrooms. To make my filling, I fried slices of firm tofu until browned on both sides — the messiest part — then set them aside to cool before slicing into smaller cubes. Next, I sautéed the sliced mushrooms in a bit of clarified butter, followed by diced onion, minced garlic, and the diced tofu. For flavor, oyster sauce, sweet soy sauce, salt, and ground black pepper. The mixture was then transferred to a bowl to cool.
Meanwhile I grilled the eggplants on the stove-top. (I used to do this in the turbo broiler, but direct flame is faster. The downside? The skin turns flaky and is messier to remove.) Then I lightly mashed the flesh with fork, dipped the eggplant in egg (beaten and seasoned), and into the oil it went.
Now some of you may wonder why I didn’t just add the egg into the filling and pack the mixture on top of the eggplant before transferring the whole thing into the pan. Too messy for me. I spoon my filling on top of the talong as it cooks, followed by more egg. I don’t flip, either. Instead I tilt the pan to spoon the oil out and over the filling — at which point everything foams up and the oil turns brown. It’s not a pretty sight, and you have to monitor the heat or the bottom of your omelette will burn.
Ma liked it — very much. Whether it was because I used graffiti in place of regular eggplant, I couldn’t be sure. Does it really matter? Unlike the fried eggplant from the previous post, which was definitely better off for being of the rounded Thai variety, this one had a lot of help. “I like the chorizo in the filling,” Ma said. And I was, like, “What chorizo?” Whatever. At the end of the day, those graffiti eggplants earned their stripes and I earned mine. But first I needed to clean up. Oh what a mess we made!
This post has no comments.
Post a Comment